Lauri Hassi

Lauri Hassi is a freelance photographer, video editor and occasional UI/UX designer. For most of his life he’s been hiking, canoeing, kayaking and doing all kinds of crazy outdoor adventures. Lauri is a big fan of Ambronite, and has got a number of stories on how Ambronite helped him to survive his winter trips.

Hiking and the outdoors are Lauri's number 1 passion in life

I love it! How do I hike in the winter, you might ask? That’s no problem. Well, of course it’s cold, and requires more prep, but it’s not life-threatening. I know how to do winter hiking in a pretty pleasant way, and for me, it turns into enjoyment. Practically speaking, one must simply adhere to the basic safety rules – dress warm, don’t get wet, take enough food. And of course, don’t take risks that you are not willing to pay for.

Surviving a snowstorm in Sweden

This one was memorable. Two of my friends and I went to Abisko for a week in early March for a winter hike and some backcountry snowboarding. Abisko is 200 kilometers north to the Arctic Circle in Sweden, close to the Norwegian border. We went there with a lot of gear that we carried in hand-made wooden sleds. We set up our base camp at an altitude of about 900 meters (3000 feet). What a beautiful place! We were surrounded by 1 000 meter peaks, with the highest peak reaching about 1 900m.

The first day was nice and sunny and we got the best out of it. But during the next couple of days local nature gods sent us a huge snow storm. It was so tough! We could barely see anything – I realised what snow blindness literally means. The snow fell horizontally. It covered everything so we had to dig every time we wanted to move out. In fact, we had to spend a few days snowed in in our tent.

I'm so happy that we had Ambronite there with us! In the winter, you always crave for warm drinks, so we came up with an Ambronite soup, mixing it with hot water and olive oil. The Abisko trip was definitely an amazing experience. We didn't get to do as much snowboarding as we had planned, but we had a lot of fun anyway.

Exploring Iceland at below zero

My friends and I were planning to hike in Iceland, but once again, the weather was not too kind to us. A few days before the trip we were informed that it was the coldest spring ever in Iceland. The track that we had planned to take was covered with snow. That made our trip quite a challenge – hiking 500 km (300 miles) in snow would take way longer than we could afford. So we decided to do smaller hikes along the coast. There was still snow everywhere, so it made for a very cold hike.

After our nutritionally successful Abisko experience, we ordered more boxes of Ambronite for our trip to Iceland. I always calculate the amount of calories I need for the trip, so we made daily calorie plans – breakfast, lunch and dinner to be 900 calories and then snacks like trail mix would make additional 900 calories, even though you still burn all of that very quickly while hiking. We usually had Ambronite for lunch, with Icelandic water and some olive oil. Olive oil is a good fat, 100g of it makes for around 900 calories! You grab that, mix it with Ambronite and your power meal is ready.

It's impossible to point out one moment that taught me the most. Also adjusting back to "normal" life after a long trip is a learning experience, but not the easiest, I'll tell you.

Ambronite as an exceptional outdoor meal solution

On hiking trips food is very important to consider. Of course, you can buy pre-packaged food from the store, but those are not that great for your health, and they don't really taste that good. What I noticed is that in most winter resorts you have one or two places that serve mainly pizzas, french fries and cheap protein bars, where even the french fries cost a ridiculous amount of money! Often, it is the only option out there, which is not optimized for physical activities and all those crazy things you are going to do on the slopes.

A huge part of snowboarding is climbing and during that time you definitely need energy. Obviously, you don’t want to carry too much heavy stuff, as climbing may take some 6-8 hours. Ambronite is the perfect solution for that. It doesn't weigh much, it's convenient, healthy and extremely nutritional. We've got a lot out of it, and it's not just energy but a great healthy feeling and less time spent on cooking.

I eat Ambronite in my urban life as well. As a freelancer you tend to have very long days, and you need a lot of energy to do all the work. I don’t eat any fast food, it’s just not good for me. Instead, I always have 1 Ambronite in my camera bag. It really saves me on the days when I have to run around and don’t have time to sit down and eat lunch.